SJ Fowler has been an incredibly prolific organiser of poetry events and collaborations over the last few years under the ‘Enemies’ and ‘Camarade’ banners. I’ve been lucky enough to collaborate with four great poets for his events, at the Rich Mix with Ghazal Mosadeq in 2011, at the Rich Mix again in February 2013 with Christodoulos Makris, at the Arnolfini in Bristol in April with David Berridge, and most recently back at the Rich Mix with Edmund Hardy at the back end of 2013.
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Roof Garden Renga
Photo: Helena Bonett
I led a series of drop-in sessions for the Southbank Centre as part of London Literature Festival 2013. Over 8 days nearly 80 participants collaborated to make renga chains, a communal poem pieced together in the roof garden.
Housekeeping
I’m slowly putting this website back together after losing the last year and a half of content – as a result everything you see here is a bit OLD. If you’d like to get in touch please drop me a line at renscombe DOT press AT yahoo.co.uk, contact me via Twitter, or visit my Vox Lab site for more recent work.
JW
The Vox Lab Poetry Residency
From March 2012 – March 2013, I was poet-in-residence with Professor Sophie Scott’s Speech Communication Lab at the Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience at UCL.
The VoxLab website contains full details of the residency, with links to the poems, performances, broadcasts and recordings that came out of the project.
The White Review Essay
I’ve got an essay on the relationship between poetry and neuroscience, and 4 poems from my Vox Lab residency, in The White Review No.7.
UPDATE: Issue 7 has sold out, but the essay is online here.
Liverpool Biennial
In 1644 John Bulwer published Chirologia: or the naturall language of the hand, one of the first analyses of the rhetorical power of hand gestures.
Using the ‘Alphabet of naturall expressions’ that Bulwer included in his Chirologia, I sourced a series of gestures by feeding Bulwer’s Latin names through a Youtube search. I then tried to explain in words how to perform these new gestures to Sally Davies and recorded the results. The instructional passages are intercut with reflections on these attempts recorded in a domestic setting.
This work was performed at Mercy’s Electronic Voice Phenomena weekend at the Liverpool Biennial 2012. Excerpt below:
For the rest, see my post on the Vox Lab website.
Poetry Parnassus at the Southbank Centre
Reading on 30 June 2012. Thanks to Holly Pester for performing with me, and SJ Fowler for programming the evening.
Upcoming: Camarade Project
Herbarium
Herbarium is an anthology of poems and songs written by 55 poets celebrating and exploring the contemporary resonances of medicinal plants and herbs for the Urban Physic Garden.
Herbarium has now sold out, but you can read the poems online or watch videos of the poets who read at the launch night on the 22 July 2011. Thanks to Steve Fowler for filming and to Wayward Plants for all their support.
This anthology is the first in the Capsule Editions series. The design was by Lina Hakim and the embossed covers were made by the Henningham Family Press.
List of poems:
Alecost / SARAH KELLY
Aloe Vera / SIMON BARRACLOUGH
Angelica / WAYNE CLEMENTS
Arnica / LIZ ADAMS
Artichoke, Globe / TIM CRESSWELL
Balloon Flower / MARCUS SLEASE
Basil, Holy / PETER JAEGER
Basil, Sweet Genovese / ISOBEL DIXON
Bergamot, Wild / EMILY HASLER
Betony / LUKE ROSIER
Bindweed / LAWRENCE BRADBY
Borage / LIZ ADAMS
Broad Bean / JAMES HARVEY
Caraway / MJ WELLER
Celery / HARRY GODWIN
Chamomile / LAURA FORMAN
Chervil / CHRIS PAGE
Chickweed / JAMES WILKES
Chicory / LUKE HEELEY
Comfrey / CLAIR WILCOX
Coriander / HANNAH SILVA
Dandelion / MATT MARTIN
Dill / JOHN CLEGG
Echinacea / MICHAEL ZAND
Elecampane / JEFF HILSON
Fennel / MENDOZA
Feverfew / TIM CRESSWELL
Flax / ANTONY JOHN
Foxglove / EDMUND HARDY
Garlic / HOLLY PESTER
Ginger / JON STONE
Ginkgo / JON STONE
Goat’s Rue / CLAIR WILCOX
Gotu Kola / LIVIA DRAGOMIR
Gravel Root / CHRISTODOULOS MAKRIS
Heartsease / LAURA FORMAN
Hemp Agrimony / CHRIS PAGE
Honeysuckle/ HELEN SLATER
Hop / MATT MARTIN
Horseradish / EMMA BENNETT
Hound’s Tongue / AMY CUTLER
Hyssop / TESSA WHITEHOUSE
Jacob’s Ladder / STEVE FOWLER
Lady’s Bedstraw / POSIE RIDER
Lady’s Mantle / EMILY CRITCHLEY
Lavender / BEN BOREK
Lemon Balm / ROWYDA AMIN
Lemongrass / CHRISSY WILLIAMS
Lemon Verbena / SARAH KELLY
Liquorice / SIMON BARRACLOUGH
Marigold / NAT RAHA
Marjoram / PHILIP TERRY
Marsh Mallow / KEITH JEBB
Meadowsweet / TESSA WHITEHOUSE
Milk Thistle / AMY CUTLER
Motherwort / CHRIS PAGE
Mugwort / MENDOZA
Mullein / JAMES WILKES
Musk Mallow / NAT RAHA
Mustard, Black / JON STONE
Mustard, White / SJ FOWLER
Nasturtium / ISOBEL DIXON
Nettle / CHRIS MCCABE
Opium Poppy / STEPHEN EMMERSON
Orach, Red / TAMARIN NORWOOD
Parsley, Curly / EMILY HASLER
Passion flower / DAVID CADDY
Pennyroyal / ALEX DAVIES
Peppermint / MICHAEL ZAND
Primose, Common / KEITH JEBB
Primose, Evening / HOLLY HOPKINS
Pulsatilla / KIRSTY IRVING
Purslane / JEFF HILSON
Rosemary / LAURA FORMAN
Rue / JAMES WILKES
Sage, Clary / PETER PHILPOTT
Sage, Common / CHRIS PAGE & JON K. SHAW
Salad Burnet / JON K. SHAW
Self-Heal, Common / POSIE RIDER
Skullcap / KIRSTY IRVING
Sorrel / JOHN CLEGG
Southernwood / PETER PHILPOTT
St John’s Wort / CAROL WATTS
Strawberry, Wild / PETER PHILPOTT
Tansy / CAROL WATTS
Tea Tree / EMILY HASLER
Thyme / MENDOZA
Toadflax / LUKE ROSIER
Valerian / ROWYDA AMIN
Vervain / FABIAN MACPHERSON
Violet, Sweet / STEVE WILLEY
Viper’s Bugloss / ISOBEL DIXON
White Horehound / SJ FOWLER
Wintergreen / SIMON BARRACLOUGH
Woodruff, Sweet / AMY CUTLER
Wood Sage / DAVID CADDY
Wormwood / PHILIP TERRY
Charter of the Forest: Two Way Radio Guided Tour
Photo: James E Smith.
This performance and guided walk was devised in collaboration with Townley & Bradby, for the Lincoln Art Programme 2011.
We communicated remotely with groups of participants via walkie talkies, giving out instructions and information, some of it unreliable, and asking people to complete tasks and speak back to the radio. Through this disembodied communication, taking place deep in the thickets, we explored the imaginative spaces of woods and forests.